Half-Real: A Video Game in the Hands of a Player (Video MP4)

This is a video recording of a lecture that Jesper Juul gave at MIT on November 28, 2006.
What happens when a player picks up a video game, learns to play it, masters it, and leaves it? Using concepts from my book on video games, Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds, I will argue that video game players are neither rational solvers of abstract problems, nor daydreamers in fictional worlds, but both of these things with shifting emphasis. The unique quality of video games is to be located in their intricate interplay of rules and fictions, which I will examine across genres, from casual games to massive multiplayer games.